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      The Study of Environment on Aboriginal Resilience and Child Health (SEARCH): study protocol

      research-article
      The SEARCH Investigators 1 ,
      BMC Public Health
      BioMed Central

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          Abstract

          Background

          Aboriginal Australians have a life expectancy more than ten years less than that of non-Aboriginal Australians, reflecting their disproportionate burden of both communicable and non-communicable disease throughout the lifespan. Little is known about the health and health trajectories of Aboriginal children and, although the majority of Aboriginal people live in urban areas, data are particularly sparse in relation to children living in urban areas.

          Methods/Design

          The Study of Environment on Aboriginal Resilience and Child Health (SEARCH) is a cohort study of Aboriginal children aged 0-17 years, from urban and large regional centers in New South Wales, Australia. SEARCH focuses on Aboriginal community identified health priorities of: injury; otitis media; vaccine-preventable conditions; mental health problems; developmental delay; obesity; and risk factors for chronic disease. Parents/caregivers and their children are invited to participate in SEARCH at the time of presentation to one of the four participating Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Organisations at Mount Druitt, Campbelltown, Wagga Wagga and Newcastle. Questionnaire data are obtained from parents/caregivers and children, along with signed permission for follow-up through repeat data collection and data linkage. All children have their height, weight, waist circumference and blood pressure measured and complete audiometry, otoscopy/pneumatic otoscopy and tympanometry. Children aged 1-7 years have speech and language assessed and their parents/caregivers complete the Parental Evaluation of Developmental Status. The Study aims to recruit 1700 children by the end of 2010 and to secure resources for long term follow up. From November 2008 to March 2010, 1010 children had joined the study. From those 446 children with complete data entry, participating children ranged in age from 2 weeks to 17 years old, with 144 aged 0-3, 147 aged 4-7, 75 aged 8-10 and 79 aged 11-17. 55% were male and 45% female.

          Discussion

          SEARCH is built on strong community partnerships, under Aboriginal leadership, and addresses community priorities relating to a number of under-researched areas. SEARCH will provide a unique long-term resource to investigate the causes and trajectories of health and illness in urban Aboriginal children and to identify potential targets for interventions to improve health.

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          Most cited references2

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          • Abstract: found
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          Randomised controlled trials addressing Australian aboriginal health needs: a systematic review of the literature.

          P Morris (1999)
          To describe the frequency and design of controlled clinical trials specifically addressing the health needs of Aboriginal Australians.
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            • Record: found
            • Abstract: found
            • Article: not found

            Injury profiles of Indigenous and non-Indigenous people in New South Wales.

            To compare the injury profiles of the Indigenous population in New South Wales with that of the non-Indigenous population.
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              Author and article information

              Journal
              BMC Public Health
              BMC Public Health
              BioMed Central
              1471-2458
              2010
              28 May 2010
              : 10
              : 287
              Affiliations
              [1 ]The SEARCH Investigators, The Sax Institute PO Box 123, Broadway NSW 2007, Australia
              Article
              1471-2458-10-287
              10.1186/1471-2458-10-287
              2896939
              20507632
              dc11cf6e-936c-4d60-b407-318881f78c4a
              Copyright ©2010 The SEARCH Investigators; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.

              This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License ( http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

              History
              : 23 April 2010
              : 28 May 2010
              Categories
              Study protocol

              Public health
              Public health

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